zenhabits » Goals & Motivation

What I’ve Learned About Learning

Leo — Thu, 03 May 2012 15:07:39 +0000

‘We learn more by looking for the answer to a question and not finding it than we do from learning the answer itself.’ ~Lloyd Alexander

Post written by Leo Babauta.

I am a teacher and an avid learner, and I’m passionate about both.

I’m a teacher because I help Eva homeschool our kids — OK, she does most of the work, but I do help, mostly with math but with everything else too. I also teach habits, writing/blogging, simplicity and other fun topics in online courses.

I’m a lifelong learner and am always obsessively studying something, whether that’s breadmaking or language or wine or chess or writing or fitness.

Here’s are two key lessons — both really the same lesson — I’ve learned about learning, in all my years of study and in trying to teach people:

Almost everything I’ve learned, I didn’t learn in school; and
Almost everything my students (and kids) have learned, they learned on their own.

Those two lessons (or one lesson) have a number of reasons and implications for learning. Let’s take a look at some of them, in hopes you might find them useful.

Why Learning is Independent

One of the foundations of Unschooling, which Eva and I and the kids do here at home, is that you’re not teaching subjects to your kids — in fact, you’re not really teaching them at all. They take responsibility for their learning, and do it because they’re interested in something, not because you tell them they should learn it.

This is exactly how I learn as an adult, and so I know it works.

When teachers (wonderful people that they were) tried to teach me something in school, I often became bored, and just did what I needed to do to do well on the test. Not because the subject or the teacher was boring, but because it wasn’t something I cared about. They wanted me to learn it because they thought I should, but that’s not why people learn something. They learn it because they care about it — because they find it incredibly interesting, or because they need it to do something they really want to do.

When teachers succeeded in getting me to learn, it was only because they made something seem so interesting that I started to care about it. But then I learned on my own, either in class while ignoring everyone else, or more likely after class in the library or at home.

That’s because someone walking you through the steps of learning something doesn’t work — you aren’t learning when you’re just listening to someone tell you how something works. You’re learning when you try to do that something — putting it into action. That’s when the real learning begins and the superficial learning ends — when you try something and fail, and adjust and try again, and solve countless little problems as you do so.

The best teachers know this, and so they inspire, and help you to put the learning into action.

As an adult, I’ve learned a lot on my own. The stuff I’ve just read, I’ve mostly forgotten. But the stuff I’ve put into action by playing with it, by practicing, by creating and sharing with others — that stuff has stuck with me. I truly learned it.

I learned about blogging when I started blogging, and kept doing it for five years — not by reading blogs about blogging. My students have learned habits and decluttering and meditation and blogging from me not because I told them something brilliants, but because the ones who really learned put it into action. They formed a simple habit, decluttered their homes, did 5 minutes of meditation for 30 days, blogged.

This is where the real learning happens — when the fingers start moving, the feet start dancing, not when you hear or read something.

How to Learn (or Teach)

The teacher’s job, really, is to fascinate the student. Fascination is the key to learning. Then help the student put the fascination into action.

It follows then, that if you’re teaching yourself, your job is exactly the same.

Here’s how to learn:

Get fascinated. As a teacher, you should fascinate the student by rediscovering with her all the things that originally fascinated you about the topic. If you can’t get fascinated, you won’t care enough to really learn something. You’ll just go through the motions. How do you get fascinated? Often doing something with or for other people helps to motivate me to look more deeply into something, and reading about other people who have been successful/legendary at it also fascinates me.
Pour yourself into it. I will read every website and book I can get my hands on. Google and the library are my first stops. They’re free. The used bookstore will be next. There are always an amazing amount of online resources to learn anything. If there isn’t, create one.
Do it, in small steps. Actually doing whatever you want to do will be scary. You can learn as much Spanish vocabulary as you like, but until you start having conversations, you won’t really know it. You can read as much about chess as you like, but you have to put the problems into action, and play games. You can read about how to program, but you won’t know it until you actually code. Start with small, non-scary steps, with as little risk as possible, focusing on fun, easy skills.
Play. Learning isn’t work. It’s fun. If you’re learning because you think you should, not because you’re having fun with it, you will not really stick with it for long, or you’ll hate it and not care about it. So make it play. Make games out of it. Sing and dance while you do it. Show off your new skills to people, with a smile on your face.
Do it with others. I believe most learning is done on your own, but doing it with others makes it fun. I like to work out with my friends and with Eva. I like to bake bread for my family. I like to play chess with my kids. That motivates me to learn, because I want to do well when I do it with others.
Feel free to move around. I will dive into something for a couple weeks, and then move on to something else. That’s OK. That’s how passion for a topic often works. Sometimes it will last for a long time, sometimes it’s a short intense burst. You can’t control it. Allow yourself to wander if that’s where things lead you.
But deep learning takes months or years. You can learn a lot about something in 2-4 weeks, but you really become an expert at something only after months and years of doing it. I knew a lot about blogging after 6 months, but I waited a couple years before I was comfortable teaching others about it. Even now, after 5+ years of blogging, I’m still learning. The same applies to habits — I’ve learned a lot after 7 years of successfully creating habits, and now can actually teach it with some confidence. So how do you allow yourself to wander, but stick with something for long enough to get deep learning? By wandering around within the topic. You can learn a lot about wine in a month, for example, but what if after that you focused on cabernet sauvignon for a month, then zinfandel, then pinot noir? What if then you decided to learn about Oregon pinot noirs, then Sonoma pinots, then (the wonderful) pinots from Burgundy? You’d be wandering around, but going deeper and deeper. You can also move away from a topic, then get fascinated with it again and come back to it.
Test yourself. You can learn a lot of information quickly by studying something, testing yourself, studying again to fill in the holes in your knowledge, testing again, and repeating until you have it by heart. That’s not always the most fun way to learn, but it can work well. Alternatively, you can learn by playing, and when you play, allow that to be your test.
Disagree. Don’t just agree that everything you’re reading or hearing from others on a topic is correct, even if they are foremost experts. First, experts are often wrong, and it’s not until they are challenged that new knowledge is found. Second, even if they are right and you are wrong by disagreeing, you learn by disagreeing. By disagreeing, you have already not only considered what you’ve been given, but formulated an alternative theory. Then you have to try to test to see which is right, and even if you find that the first information or theory was right and you were wrong, now you know that much better than if you just agreed. I’m not saying to disagree with everything, but the more you do, the better you’ll learn. Don’t disagree in a disagreeable way, and don’t hold onto your theories too tightly and be defensive about them.
Teach it. There is no better way to cement your knowledge than to teach it to others. It’s OK if you don’t really know it that well — as long as you’re honest about that when you’re teaching it to someone. For example, I’m a beginner at chess, but I will learn something about it and teach it to my kids — they know I’m not a tournament contender, let alone a master, and yet I’m still teaching them something they don’t know. And when I do, I begin to really understand it, because to teach you have to take what you’ve absorbed, reflect upon it, find a way to organize it so that you can communicate it to someone else clearly enough for them to understand it, see their mistakes and help correct them, see where the holes in your knowledge are, and more.
Learning can be subliminal. We think we’re in control of our minds and we’re like programmers telling our minds what to learn, how to learn, and what data to retain. No. Our minds work in mysterious ways, and cannot be tightly controlled. They wander, latch onto the weirdest things, and soak up more than we know. Later, you can come back to what you’ve absorbed, and test yourself, and find you knew something you didn’t realize you knew. The lesson is to expose yourself to as much as possible on a topic, and allow yourself to absorb it. Sometimes your mind will pick up patterns you didn’t consciously realize were there, but then can use those patterns later when you put the learning into action.
Reflect on your learning by blogging. You soak up a ton of information and patterns, and you can put that into action, but when you sit down and reflect on what you’ve learned, and try to share that with others (as I’m doing right now), you force yourself to think deeply, to synthesize the knowledge and to organize it, much as you do when you teach it to others. Blogging is a great tool for reflection and sharing what you’ve learned, even if you don’t hope to make a living at it. And it’s free.

‘The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education.’ ~Albert Einstein

Crazy Talk: The Do-What-You-Love Guide

Leo — Thu, 19 Apr 2012 17:36:08 +0000

‘Everything you can imagine is real.’ ~Pablo Picasso

Post written by Leo Babauta.

When I wrote the first words of this blog, more than five years ago, I had no idea those few keystrokes would change my life.

I thought I was doing nothing more than reflecting on the changes that had been happening in my life, sharing a bit about what I learned with a handful of friends. I thought those tinkling of computer keys would fade into the void, as most of my thoughts had before that.

I didn’t imagine that a year later, I would have 26,000 people reading my blog (and eventually a quarter million subscribers), that I’d finally be out of debt, that I’d have my first book publishing contract, that I’d happily hand in my resignation for my day job. All of that was out of the realm of possibility.

That’s the amazing realization here: that we rule out the possibility of great change, because it doesn’t seem realistic. For nearly two decades I focused on going to college, and working at a day job that I sometimes enjoyed but often dreaded, because that’s what we expect should happen. Starting my own business, pursuing my dreams, doing something I loved? Crazy talk.

Crazy talk is what I’m going to give you today, in hopes that perhaps one of you will expand your possibilities. It is possible — I did it, all while working a full-time job, doing free-lance writing on the side, and having a wife and six kids. I did it, even if I never dared to dream it for the first three decades of my life.

I am not someone who likes to give career advice, or teach people to be online entrepreneurs. So I’m not going to do that here. I’ll just tell you this: it’s possible. Yes, it absolutely is possible.

And I’ll share what I’ve learned, in small snippets of goodness, about doing what you love.

If you don’t think it’s possible, do a small easy test. Don’t think you can start a blog? Sign up for a free WordPress.com or Blogger.com account and do a short post. Don’t tell anyone about it. Just write a post. It costs nothing, risks nothing, takes almost no time. But you will learn you can do that one little thing, and if you pass that test, you now know your theory of impossibility was wrong. You can do this with any skill, btw, not just blogging.

Expand your tests. If you pass the first test, do another small one. Then another. Keep going and notice your confidence grow. Your skills grow along with the confidence. It’s amazingly simple. Iterate and re-iterate as long as you are having fun.

If you don’t know what you love, don’t worry. There’s no need to figure that out right away. Try something that someone else is doing, and see if you think it’s fun. The real fun part, btw, comes when you start to get good at it, so perhaps stick with it for awhile and enjoy the learning, then enjoy being good at it. If that first try doesn’t work, try something else. You don’t have to commit to one thing for your entire life. You can do a dozen a year if you want, for a decade. You’ll probably find something by then.

Find inspiration. Who else is doing what you love doing? Who is excited about it most? Follow them. Learn about them. See what path they took. Watch closely how they execute, what they do right. Learn from the best.

Reach out to a mentor. Of the people who inspire you the most, try to make contact with a few of them. If they never respond, try a few more. See if you can buy them lunch or coffee. Don’t pitch them on anything. Just ask for their help, and say you’d love for them to mentor you in a way that won’t take up much of their time. Don’t demand a lot of time, but go to them when you’re having trouble making big decisions.

Choose one passion at random. Some people have many interests and don’t know where to start. Pick one or two randomly if they’re all about equal, and just get started. Don’t let choice paralyze you. Get started, because in the end it won’t matter if you started with the wrong passion — you’ll learn something valuable no matter what. Read more.

Get good at it. You get good at something with practice. Allow your friends and family to be your first audience, readers, customers. Then take on a few others at a low cost, or increase your audience slowly. But always have an audience or customers if possible — you’ll get good much faster this way, with feedback and accountability. Read about it. Watch videos. Take a class. Join a group of others learning. Find people to partner with. Before long, you’ll be good at it.

Help others. One of the best ways to get good at something is to help others learn. Making someone’s life better with your new skill is also an amazing way to get satisfaction out of what you do, to love what you do. Help as many people as you can in any way possible — it will pay off.

Find your voice. Eventually, as you master your skill, you will learn that you are different than the thousands of others doing it. You will find your uniqueness. It’s not necessarily there at first, because you might not have the technical skills to express yourself. But eventually, find that voice. Find the thing that sets you apart, that helps you to stand out from the crowd. Then emphasize that. Read more.

How can you be valuable? What can you do that is valuable to others? Sometimes it’s doing something that they really need. Sometimes it’s doing it better than others. Sometimes it’s saving people time, or money. Other times it’s just making their lives better, brighter, pleasanter in some way.

Become an expert. If you get good at something, and help others, and find a voice, and become valuable — you’ll become an expert at what you do. Others will turn to you for advice. Help them. Read more.

Sell your own stuff. I’ve found that the best way to make a revenue, by far, is by selling your own stuff. I’ve tried ads and affiliate links, and while I have nothing against those things, the thing that works best for me is selling my own stuff. I’ve already proven to my audience that I’m valuable and honest and trustworthy, and so they are much more likely to want something that I’ve created than something I recommend made by others. So create something valuable that will help others, and sell it.

Don’t be a jerk. Too many people online are so worried about maximizing subscriber numbers or pageviews that they do things that are disrespectful to their readers. Asking me to click “Next Page” five times to read your article? Jerk move. Having a pop-up asking me to subscribe before I’ve even read the article I came to read? Jerk move. Screaming at me to “Like” your page on Facebook, when I could decide that on my own without being asked if the article was really good? Jerk move. Learn to feel what is respectful, and what’s a jerk move.

Don’t let numbers rule you. Numbers are arbitrary and basically worthless. How many readers do you have? No one really knows, and in the end the number of readers doesn’t matter as much as things like: how much do they care about your articles, how much have you helped them, how much do they trust you, how excited are they? Pageviews don’t matter, neither do Facebook fans or Twitter followers or the number of people on your mailing list. Instead of worrying about numbers, pour yourself into your work, make yourself incredibly valuable, help people as much as possible, love what you do. The numbers will come as a side effect.

It’s the doing and loving that matters. Many people focus on growing, or hitting goals, or making money, but they forget what matters. What matters most is loving what you do. If you love it, and you’re doing it, you’ve already succeeded. Don’t worry so much about achieving certain levels of success — people push themselves so hard to reach those things that they forget to enjoy what they’re doing, and in the process they lose the reason they’re doing it in the first place.

Dream bigger. Once you’ve overcome the initial fear and started to become good at something you love, dream bigger. The first stage is small steps, but don’t stop there. You can change lives. You can change the world. Doing so will change you.

Why We Overplan

Leo — Tue, 17 Apr 2012 14:40:52 +0000

‘A good traveler has no fixed plans, and is not intent on arriving.’ ~Lao Tzu

Post written by Leo Babauta.

There is something about my mind, and many people’s minds, that is overly optimistic.

We think we can do so much each day, and so we overplan. We fill our plans with so much, confident we can do it all, ignoring the evidence of the past when most plans didn’t get done and most things didn’t get crossed off as hoped.

We believe that, sure, we might have failed to meet our expectations in the past, but this time will be different! This time, we will do better. This time, we will be disciplined and productive and get more done.

Yes, that’s an excellent plan. Let me know how that works out.

Hint: It never works out for me. I’ll give you a good recent example.

What I Learned on Vacation

As I said last week, my family and I recently went on a short vacation to sunny and sublime San Diego for four days. As usual, I had lots of goals and expectations (I can’t seem to help it):

I bought a book (The Girl Who Kicked the Hornets’ Nest) and planned to finish it in just over 4 days of vacation — which meant about 150 pages per day. No problem!

I brought a yoga DVD, planning on doing yoga every morning as the kids slept in.

I thought I could do some beach running every morning too, as we were staying a block from the beach.

I had lots of work I thought I could get done too.

And of course, we were going to walk around and explore San Diego all day, hang out at the beach for hours, and eat at lots of restaurants.

Guess how much of that got done? I did read a fair amount, but only about half the book. I didn’t even open the plastic wrapping on the yoga DVDs. I did almost no work. I ran for maybe 10 minutes at the beach once. We did a lot of walking and exploring and eating, and hung out at the beach a fair amount, but little else.

I overplanned. I was overly optimistic. I had lots of goals and expectations.

Yes, I’ve been mostly going without goals for awhile now, but I slip into my old habits frequently.

Not Overplanning in Real Life

Sure, many experienced travelers know that I made a basic traveling mistake — overplanning is common among travelers, and the best of us plan very little on most trips. I know this, and usually follow that advice. I guess the plans above were subconscious plans and goals that my mind was making without me really trying. It was only during the middle of the trip that I realized I’d had high expectations of myself for the trip, and had set goals without realizing it.

But here’s the thing: travelers know we should travel without goals and too many plans … but what about in the rest of our lives?

Most people who travel with few plans and goals ignore this wisdom in regular, daily life.

In our daily personal and work lives, we overload ourselves and overplan. We are overly optimistic about what we can do, despite past evidence. We set too many goals and have too high expectations.

Here’s what I’ve learned from my vacation (and the last couple years) that can help with overplanning and goal setting in our daily lives:

Leave plans to a minimum. That’s not to say you won’t do anything, but plan as little as possible — most of what you might plan won’t get done anyway. Why create a fiction? Leave wide open blocks with few scheduled appointments when possible.

Learn to act fluidly. If your day is mostly wide open, how do you fill it? Flexibly. You don’t have plans or goals, but know how to pick your priorities fluidly, in the moment. At this moment, what is the thing you’re most excited about? What is the most important thing you can do? What can you do that will change your life the most? This is a skill that you learn by practice, but planning ahead what you should do makes no sense when the landscape is changing constantly.

We are not walking a path, but surfing a sea. Most people look at goal setting as picking a destination, then figuring out a path to get there. That assumes you’re walking on land that will change very little, and that while you will have unforeseen obstacles, you’ll be on stable ground and the destination won’t move. That’s not at all true — life is more like the sea, ever changing with no fixed paths or destinations, with swells and currents and waves that change everything at every moment. The ultimate skill, then, isn’t setting a destination (goal) or a path (plan), but surfing. In surfing, you take whatever waves come, learn to judge the waves as they come, learn to ride the wave as it changes, not as you planned. It’s going with the flow (literally), and changing what you do depending on how the flow changes.

Your plans might fall apart, but life will be greater for it. While nothing went as I’d apparently hoped it would on our trip, I was completely happy. We still filled our days with exploring and trying new things and play, and living in the moment meant I didn’t care that I didn’t get the work done or do the yoga or accomplish the massive amounts of reading I’d hoped. Life changes things, and it’s when we cling to our goals and plans that we are unhappy or stressed — when we learn to surf the wave as it comes, we can be very happy, no matter what comes.

How to Go From Fear to Freedom, One Step at a Time

guest — Tue, 03 Apr 2012 14:45:17 +0000

Life is a gift, and it offers us the privilege, opportunity, and responsibility, to give something back. ~ Anthony Robbins

Editor’s note: This is a guest post from Tess Marshall of The Bold Life.

Every path to success has been littered with doubt, fear, and uncertainty, as well as persistence, calculated risks and repeated action.

The difference between someone who fails and someone who succeeds is the courage to act, repeatedly.

When I was 22 years old, I was mom to four daughters under the age of four. My third pregnancy was twins. Taking care of them was utter madness at such a young age.

I lived in a constant state of exhaustion. I lost weight, I had dark circles under my eyes, and I had suicidal thoughts.

The impulse I fought, was to run, to leave and never look back. My biggest fear at the time was, “I’m not capable.”

In my state of exhaustion, while crying myself to sleep at night, I would ask my husband again and again, “What am I going to do. How am I suppose to keep going?”

He never faltered, his answer was always the same, “You’re going to get out of bed tomorrow morning and put one foot in front of the other. You’re going to do it one step at a time. That’s how you’re going to do it.”

For 22 years that’s exactly what I did.

I made the decision to follow his advice. I was young, strong, and determined. I would focus only on the step in front of me and I would not fail.

It was the most difficult job I ever had.

Leo coined the word, “Joyfear” last year during an exercise at The World Domination Summit and wrote it on his arm.

He defines Joyfear as the mixture of two powerful emotions, joy and fear.

Leo goes on to say, “It turns out every single defining moment in my life has been filled with Joyfear, with a mixture of intense joy and intense fear into one ball of powerful emotions that both lift me up and make me see things clearly when I hadn’t before.”

When I read that I remember thinking, “I know exactly what he is talking about.”

I know now, that the emotion that propelled me forward, as a young parent was Joyfear. Today the girls are 39, 37, 35 and 35 years old.

What fear is holding you back? Where do you feel incapable? What daunting task can you complete, one step at a time?

Read on for action steps that will propel you forward.

Make the decision to succeed. Once you decide on success you rarely allow doubt to enter your mind. Your persistence, dedication, and resilience are strengthened. You free yourself to do the uncommon and the impossible.

Take risks. Chase your fear. Do what scares you. Make the dreaded phone call. Ask for what you want. When you experience rejection, ask someone else. Be bold and brave. Defy the odds.

Be prepared. Anticipate your own needs. Unemployment is the world’s fastest-rising worry, according to a BBC World Service survey. Don’t live in fear, create solutions in advance. Know how you will get out, over, around, and through what could go wrong.

Let go of urgency and fear. Learn to relax and go with the flow. Our anxiety and stress are caused by living in the pain of the past or the fear of the future. Life happens in the present moment.

Focus on the benefits of your success. Become focused on what you will gain. Is your benefit financial freedom, travel, saving the lives of others, or leaving a legacy you can be proud of? When the going gets tough, focus on your “why.”

Calm your body. Find a quiet place and bring your attention inward, notice where your fear resides in your body. Notice if you have a tense forehead, shallow breathing, or aching shoulders. Relax the area of your body that’s being affected. Learn to calm and center yourself.

Create your own fan base. I believe that most people have good hearts. They want to see you succeed. Believe people are cheering for you. When you are scared out of your mind, imagine everyone you know in one place rooting wildly for you.

Participate in life. Turn off your television, electronics, and the negative media. Take a guitar lesson, a skydiving lesson or yoga lesson. Swim in the ocean, hike in the mountains, or go for a morning walk or run.

You are enough. Accept who you are and where you are today. When you compare yourself to others you create your own suffering. My friends were in college when I was changing diapers. I was too busy to care. What others think of you is none of your business.

Hugh Macleod, from Gaping Void, has advice for our economic times: “Learn how to work hard, work long hours, find something you love, and then excel at it. Above all else, learn how to create, learn how to invent. That’s your only hope, really.”

I agree with Hugh, however — unless you can learn how to move through your fear, you’ll continue to hold yourself back. You’ll never learn to risk, to excel, to create, to invent or to experience Joyfear.

Tess Marshall is the founder of The Bold Life, where she inspires people to live a fearless life. If you are tired of being stuck in fear and want to step into your greatness, click here to learn more about Take Your Fear and Shove It.

How to Build the Muscle of Change

Leo — Fri, 02 Mar 2012 16:32:19 +0000

Post written by Leo Babauta.

When you try to make a change in your life, create a new habit, set a resolution … are you usually good at it, or does the change fail after 2-3 weeks?

Some people are better at it than others because they’ve learned some simple strategies for changing, but also because they’ve built up their change muscle.

What’s a change muscle? It’s the muscle we use for creating changes in our lives, and like our physical muscles, it is weak if you haven’t trained it.

I started training my change muscle in 2005, when it was weak and I could never make any lasting changes. I felt helpless, and didn’t know what to do. I felt like I couldn’t ever make changes.

But I’ve learned in the years since that the change muscle is like other muscles: you might be weak at first, but you get stronger with regular training.

Imagine trying to lift a barbell with 350 lbs. of weights on it. Even lifting it 6 inches off the ground would be a nearly impossible feat for people who haven’t trained their muscles to lift heavy loads. You’d struggle and nearly burst a vein, but you wouldn’t budge the barbell. But … if you started with just the barbell (no weights on it) and began lifting that, you’d be much more likely to succeed. Then add 5-10 lbs. on each side, and your muscles will grow stronger. Keep adding a little at a time, and soon you’ll be able to lift the 350-lb. loaded barbell that once seemed impossible.

Your change muscle works in the same ways. As I’ve been learning about growing physical muscles, I realize how many parallels there are with growing the change muscle.

Principles of Growth

The principles for growing your change muscle are similar to growing regular muscles:

Start small. If you try to lift too much weight at first, you’ll have bad form and injure yourself and won’t last long. But if you start with just the barbell (or other light load), you can learn how to lift and you’re much more likely to stick with it for awhile. The change muscle is the same: start with one change, just 5 minutes a day. You will want to do more, but if you do more, you’re much more likely to fail in the long run.

Train regularly. Some people will go to the gym for a week, then stop, then start again in a few months. This is a waste of time, and no progress will be seen. You have to do it regularly to see progress. Same with the change muscle: do it daily, just 5 minutes a day. You’ll get stronger and stronger with regular training. Don’t start big, then fail after 1-2 weeks, then start again later. Regular repetition is key.

Increase load gradually. If you don’t increase the weights, you don’t get stronger. But if you increase too much, you’ll get injured. With your change muscle, increase your daily training by 5 minutes each week — so 5 minutes a day the first week, then 10 minutes a day the second week, etc. You’ll be amazed at how strong your change muscle gets with gradual progressive loading.

Rest, & cut back on other work. Most people don’t understand the importance of rest when it comes to training. We train, then rest, and we grow. If we don’t rest, we hurt our progress. Growing the change muscle is the same — you need to train (just 5 minutes a day at first), then rest. Meaning don’t try to make changes all day long at first. Don’t try to make your first change as you’re traveling and taking on big projects and also taking classes and making three other changes at the same time. You’ll overload yourself. Make one change, and let yourself stick to your regular routine/load the rest of the day.

Fuel the growth. Aside from rest, fuel is one of the most overlooked aspects of muscle growth. You need sufficient calories for growth, otherwise all the training in the world won’t get you anywhere. So what fuels the growth of the change muscle? Motivation. Find as many ways to motivate yourself as possible: make the change enjoyable, get a partner, join a class, blog publicly about it, join a forum, create rewards, celebrate small victories, create a chart to see your progress, etc. The more, the better. Most people underfuel their change muscle.

First Steps

So how do you get started training your change muscle if it’s weak and undertrained? Just like you’d get started with strength training — start with bodyweight exercises, and just a few per day.

Here’s what I’d recommend:

Pick an easy, positive change that you can do in 5 minutes. Want to garden? Just 5 minutes of gardening a day. Want to declutter? Eat fruits and veggies? Jog or swim? Meditate? Just 5 minutes a day.

Focus on enjoying the new habit. If you enjoy it, you’ll want to keep doing it for longer. If you’re doing it to “improve” or because it’s “good for you” or you “should”, you won’t stick with it for long.

The focus is on doing it regularly, not on growing it quickly. Do it daily, at the same time every day.

Cut back on other changes, so you can put all your energy on this one change.

Fuel your change with as much motivation as humanly possible. More is better in this case.

Grow it gradually by adding 5 minutes to your daily training a week.

You’ll be amazed at how much progress you make over time, as your change muscle grows stronger.

We tend to blame our failures on our lack of discipline, but we’re not undisciplined … we’re just undertrained. Grow your change muscle with smart principles of growth, and soon you’ll be a hulking beast of a change master.

It’s Not Too Late to Change Your Habits

Leo — Tue, 21 Feb 2012 17:53:09 +0000

Post written by Leo Babauta.

A (slightly) older reader wrote to me recently, wanting to know how to change her bad habits ingrained after so many many years of doing them. She wanted to know, “Is it too late to change?”

And I can understand the feeling. Doing bad habits for years makes them deeply entrenched, and getting out of that trench might seem impossible, hopeless.

I once was stuck, and felt the weight of built up bad habits crushing, smothering, burying me. I felt helpless, like I had no control over myself, and was too discouraged to even try to change.

This discouragement is what does it. It’s not that changing bad habits is impossible. But if we are so discouraged we don’t try, we will never change them. To try and to fail is of little consequence, but to never start at all is fatal to the habit change.

And I’m here to tell you, that changing bad habits is not impossible. No matter how long you’ve done them, no matter how many decades.

It can be done. By you. By taking a single step.

Here’s how.

Know as you start that you aren’t changing a mountain. You don’t have to change years of bad actions. Those actions are gone — they’ve evaporated into the ether, and you can forget them. Forgive yourself for them, then forget them.

You don’t need to run a marathon to change a habit. You just need to take a step. And you can take a step.

Consider for a moment your bad habit. You might have a dozen, but choose an easy one. Not the one you’re most afraid of — the one you think you can lick.

Take a step back and think about this habit. When do you do it? What things trigger the habit — stress, food, drinking, socializing, boredom, sadness, waking, being criticized? What need does the habit fulfill for you? Know that it does fulfill a real need, and that’s why you keep doing it.

Realize something — stop here to drive home for yourself a crucial, crucial point: you must realize that you don’t need this habit to fulfill this need. You don’t need the habit. You can deal with stress in healthier ways. You can beat boredom. You can cope. You do not need the habit, and you will learn better ones with practice.

You might be feeling a bit overwhelmed at this point, but you’ve done the hardest part. Now you just need to take one more little step.

Commit to yourself to make a small tiny insignificant but powerful step each day. Commit fully, not half-assed. Commit by writing it down, and putting it up on your wall. Commit by telling a friend about it, and asking for help. Commit by putting it on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, your blog, a forum you frequent. Be all in.

Find a replacement habit. One that is healthier. One that fulfills the need. One that is easy. One that you can do after your trigger, instead of your bad habit. One that you enjoy and will look forward to. If you need to relieve stress, for example, consider walking, or pushups, or deep breathing, or self-massage.

You’re now ready to climb out of your trench. Remember, just a tiny tiny step.

Notice your urge to do the habit. Pause. Don’t do the bad habit. Let the urge pass, then do your new replacement habit.

Repeat, noticing the urge, letting the urge pass, not doing the bad habit, doing the good habit instead. You might mess up, but that’s OK. You’ll get better with practice.

Practice as often as you can, every day. You’ll get really good at it. Don’t worry about how long it takes. Keep doing it, one urge at a time.

Know, Consider, Realize, Commit, Find, Notice, Repeat, Practice. These are easy steps that don’t take a lot of work. You can do them as you sit here, reading this post.

It’s never too late. There is no habit that can’t be broken by the pressure of a single footprint. Make that footprint by taking a single step, today.

The Pause Upon Which All Else Relies

Leo — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 15:56:00 +0000

Post written by Leo Babauta.

There is one little habit I’ve learned that has changed everything else in my life.

The pause.

When we fail, it’s because we act on urges without thinking, without realizing it. We have the urge to eat junk, and we do it. We have the urge to check email instead of writing a chapter of our book, and so we open our inbox. We have an urge to smoke, to drink, to do drugs, to chew our nails, to play a Facebook game, to procrastinate, to skip a workout, to eat more fries, to criticize, to act in jealousy or anger, to be rude … and we act on that urge.

What if instead we learned to pause after each urge? What if we stopped, looked at that urge, paid close attention to what it feels like inside our bodies, but didn’t act?

The urge would no longer control us. We would be able to make conscious choices that might be healthier for us, help us be happier.

If we can pause, we create space. Space to breathe, to think, to be without acting.

The pause is the answer to so many of our problems. Such a small thing, and so powerful.

To develop the pause, notice your next urge. Is it an urge to go check something online? Or eat something you know isn’t healthy for you? Pay attention to the urge, learn as much as you can about it. If you act on it after the pause, that’s OK. Just notice it, and pause, and pay attention.

Do it again for the next urge, and the next. You will get good at it with practice, and you’ll have lots of opportunities to practice.

The urges won’t go away, but your ability to pause will get stronger. And when you have the pause, you have everything.

Clearing Your Life for a New Year

Leo — Mon, 09 Jan 2012 19:55:26 +0000

Post written by Leo Babauta.

Every January, people rush out and get a gym membership, set a list of goals or resolutions, and get ready to take on a new year of frenetic activity.

Unfortunately, we don’t often clear space to make room for all this new stuff.

The beginning of the year is a great time for renewal of energy and taking on the things we’ve always wanted to tackle — clutter, fitness, work we’re passionate about, debt, and so on. But it’s also a great time to clear out your life, starting out the year on a blank page that’s ready to be filled.

While everyone’s life is different, I’ll share some of what I do to clear out my life.

Review the year to think about what I learned, what mistakes I made, what I accomplished.

Clear my schedule as much as possible. That often means saying no to people.

Wrap up old projects, end commitments to people, so that my work plate is clearer than normal.

Toss out old fitness and eating plans, to make room for new experiments.

Clear my email inbox. If I haven’t answered the email recently, it’s probably not important, so I archive it. Act on or answer other emails, so that my inbox is emptied.

Clear out other inboxes. That might be an inbox on a social network, or a list of things I wanted to do or read, or any kind of list really. File them away under someday, or delete or archive. Anything that’s taking some mental energy because I know I need to get to it, gets cleared.

Clear my computer files. Usually this means deleting a bunch of files I don’t need, but I also just consolidate files into one folder or put them in an online archive (like in Dropbox).

Clear paperwork. I rarely have any papers these days — I’ve slowly turned everything digital. But I still get things in the mail sometimes, so if I have any lying around, I dispose of them to clear out any remaining paperwork.

Clear clutter. If there are areas that have become cluttered, I clear them out. Often it just means taking a box or bag of things that I’ve been meaning to donate to Goodwill.

Clear my errands. I’ll make a list of all the errands I’ve been putting off, and do them in one afternoon.

Clear my finances. I’ll take a few minutes to review my checking and savings accounts, Paypal, investments, etc. and make sure everything is in order. If there are little things that need taking care of, I do them so that my mind is cleared.

Clear pantry and refrigerator of junk. Old crap that’s been lying around. Junk food if there’s any there (I don’t usually have any anymore, but I used to). Left with just good whole ingredients for healthy foods.

This might take a couple days, working off and on in little bits. For some, it might take longer. But when you’re done, it’s amazing. Your mind is clear and refreshed. You feel like you’re ready to take on anything.

To be honest, I do these things regularly throughout the year, and it’s great to keep a clean slate most of the time. But the new year is always a perfect opportunity to clear everything at once.

How to Have the Best Year of Your Life (without Setting a Single Goal)

guest — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 16:15:24 +0000

Editor’s note: This is a guest post from Jeff Goins of Goins, Writer.

This new year, do something different: stop setting goals.

If the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again expecting different results, then making resolutions for another year is a sure-fire way to drive yourself crazy. I did it for years, and it got me nothing.

Resolutions are pipe dreams, and goals are a waste of time. They are designed to trick you into believing all you need to change your life is a plan.

But plans don’t work. Life is too chaotic and busy. For most of us, it’s impossible to stick to a list of goals for more than a few weeks, not to mention an entire year.

So how do you change your life? By controlling what you can: your daily habits.

The Pointlessness of Plans

Most good things happen without a plan: friendships, falling in love, finding a job, and so on. If you want to make your new year count, you’ll need to be intentional — not by setting goals, but by making space in your life for what really matters.

This was how I was able to get into shape, launch a blog, train for a half-marathon, get a book deal, and keep my day job this year — while loving every minute of it.

Most productivity systems focus on beginning with the “end in mind” and setting goals to get there. Many are based on the assumption that in order to get what you want later, you have to give up what you want now. You work the plan, endure pain, and win.

But this is not the only path you can take.

I just finished one of the best years of my life, and most of it was completely unplanned. How did I do it? By creating new disciplines I actually liked doing. I wasn’t only fixated on the end results; I also enjoyed the process.

This is the secret to a healthy, productive life and to making an impact on the world. Create good, sustainable habits that you enjoy, and you’ll end up with a life you can be proud of.

Instead of Goals

There is an alternative to setting goals that will bring you closer to the life you want. Focus on a few practices you can enjoy doing on a regular basis. The trick here is consistency. These four helped me:

Get up early. When the world wakes up, distractions abound. If you are going to focus on creating a new life for yourself, you’ll need to find the time. The best way to do this is to work while others are sleeping. At first, I didn’t like waking up before the sun, but eventually my body adjusted and I began looking forward to the solitude.

Over-commit. The adage “under-promise and over-deliver” is a farce. It only propagates the status quo. Real difference-makers push boundaries. They test, prod, and poke until something gives. You can do this, too, by saying “yes” to more things than you’re comfortable with. Learn to stretch yourself. You might be surprised by what you’re actually capable of. Your confidence will grow, too.

Talk to strangers. Relationships are what make the world go round. This is true for your career, personal well-being, and inner life. When you meet new people, you make connections that can lead to all kinds of future breakthroughs. Even when it’s uncomfortable, reach out and introduce yourself to new people. The worst they can say is “no.” Fortunately, many won’t.

Practice generosity. Give away your time, money, services, and ideas. When you do this, you will get a lot more than you give. People will learn to trust you, and if you really help them, they will tell others about you. This will build your reputation, and you will have more friends than you know what to do with. And as the saying goes, what goes around really does come around.

After a year of doing these things, I ended up with a life I couldn’t have imagined or planned for. And I had a blast doing it. So I’m going to do it all over again, without setting a single goal.

The best year of your life is within reach — if you are willing to give up on the craziness of plans and instead focus on creating new habits. The first step is to begin.

Read more from Jeff at his blog, Goins, Writer, or get his free eBook The Writer’s Manifesto.

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Reminder: Clutterfat Challenge Webinar Tonight

From Leo: Just a reminder that I’m holding a free live webinar tonight (Thursday Jan. 5, 2012) at 8 pm EST to help you with the Clutterfat Challenge. I’ll talk about some of the best ways to tackle the challenge — how to tackle your mountains of stuff, how to deal with some of the tougher items, and so on. You’ll also be able to ask me questions live.

Join me for the webinar here: Clutterfat Challenge Webinar (free, and we won’t ask for your email).

Note: The webinar won’t be on this page until 8 pm EST (Thursday Jan. 5, 2012).

You can still sign up for the Clutterfat Challenge — a 30-day challenge to reduce your clutter.

There’s also still time to sign up for the paid Clutterfree Course, which starts on January 10th, to keep you motivated and excited about your journey. Through course materials, homework, live webinars and personal feedback, you’ll have all the tools you need to clear the clutter for good. Register by Saturday, January 7th.

100 Days with No Goals

guest — Fri, 09 Dec 2011 16:05:55 +0000

Editor’s Note: This is a guest post from Joshua Fields Millburn of The Minimalists.

I have lived the last 100 days with no goals. And I have never been happier or more content in my life.

When I met Leo four months ago — two-thousand miles from my home in Dayton, Ohio — he said there were three things that significantly changed his life: establishing habits he enjoyed, simplifying his life, and living with no goals.

I was already living the first two: I had established my pleasurable habits, I had simplified my life. But it was difficult for me to grasp the “no goals” thing. The thought of living a life with no goals sounded insane to me — it was counterintuitive, it was scary, it went against almost everything I had ever learned about productivity.

In my corporate life of yesteryear, I managed hundreds of people for a large corporation, an organization in which I was often considered the productivity guy, the goal guy: I met deadlines, overproduced, exceeded expectations, got results. That’s why they paid me the big bucks.

I regularly had umpteen goals in various stages of completion: short-term goals, long-term goals, personal goals, business goals, health goals, financial goals, vacation goals, consumer-purchasing goals, you name it. I thought if I crossed enough goals off my to-do list, I’d eventually be content. So I worked harder and harder, focusing on every new goal with lapidary precision.

But I was stressed out of my mind with all those goals. My hauntingly perpetual to-do list was just that — perpetual, never-ending. And it was ever-growing. Plus, I was continuously disappointed when I didn’t achieve a goal, or when I missed a deadline. Hell, I was even disappointed when I attained a goal but didn’t overachieve. It was a self-consuming cocaine high — it was never enough.

I needed a way to quit my goals cold turkey, so I did two things after speaking with Leo.

First, I asked myself, “why do I have these goals?” I had goals so I could tell if I was “accomplishing” what I was “supposed” to accomplish. If I met a goal, I was allowed to be happy — right? Then I thought: Wait a minute, why must I achieve a specific result towards an arbitrary goal to be happy? Why don’t I just allow myself to be happy now?

Second, I decided to live with no goals for a while. I didn’t know how long, because I didn’t make it a goal. I figured I’d give it a shot for a month or so, maybe longer, to see what happened. If it affected me negatively, I could return to my rigid life of “achieving” and “producing results” with my color-coded spreadsheets containing scads of goals.

What happened? Breaking free from goals changed my life.

Three Ways Living with No Goals Changed My Life

1. I am less stressed. I have virtually no stress now. Sure, there are brief moments in which I feel vexed or bothered — but I feel so much less stress these days. People I’ve known for years comment on how calm I am. With no goals, they say I’m a different person — a better person.

2. I am more productive. I didn’t anticipate this one. I thought getting rid of goals meant I was going to sacrifice results and productivity. But the opposite has been true. I tossed productivity and became more productive. I’ve written the best fiction of my life, I’ve watched our website’s readership increase significantly, I’ve met remarkable new people, and I’ve been able to contribute to other people like never before. The last 100 days have been the most productive days of my life.

3. I am happier and more content. During my 30 years on this earth, I’ve never been this consistently happy or content. It is an incredible feeling, even surreal at times. With the decreased stress and increased productivity resulting from no goals, I am able to enjoy my life, I am able to live in the moment. And thus I am appreciably happier and more content.

Three Misconceptions About No Goals

Three arguments against the no-goal lifestyle presented themselves to me in the last 100 days, all three of which I’d like to address.

1. Complacency: Doesn’t a life with no goals make you complacent? Well, if by “complacent” you mean “content,” then yes. But, otherwise, no it didn’t make me complacent. In fact, the opposite was true: after removing the stress from my life, I partook in new, exciting endeavors, while living a passionate, meaningful life.

2. Growth: Doesn’t a life with no goals prevent you from growing? No. I’ve grown considerably in the last 100 days. I’ve gotten into the best shape of my life, strengthened my personal relationships, established new relationships, and written more than ever before. I’ve grown more in the last 100 days than any other 100-day period in my life.

3. You still have goals: You say you have no goals, but don’t you still have some goals, like finishing your new novel or “being happy” or “living in the moment”? It’s important to make a distinction here: yes, I want to “be happy” and “live in the moment” and “live a healthy life,” but these are choices, not goals. I choose to be happy. I choose to live in the moment. I choose to live a healthy life. I don’t need to measure these events, I simply live this way. As for my new novel, I intend to finish writing it — I’ve never worked harder on anything in my life — but I’m enjoying the process of writing it, and if I never finish, that’s okay too. I’m not stressed about it anymore.

Living with no goals has changed my life. It has added layers of happiness and contentment I didn’t realize were possible. It has allowed me to contribute to other people in meaningful ways. I’m not going back to a goal-oriented life. No goals. None at all. Life is outstanding without them.

Joshua Fields Millburn writes essays with Ryan Nicodemus about minimalism and living a meaningful life with less stuff at The Minimalists. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook, or Google+. Subscribe to The Minimalists for free updates.

zenhabits » Goals & Motivation

What I’ve Learned About Learning

Post written by Leo Babauta.

Why Learning is Independent

How to Learn (or Teach)

Crazy Talk: The Do-What-You-Love Guide

Post written by Leo Babauta.

Why We Overplan

Post written by Leo Babauta.

What I Learned on Vacation

Not Overplanning in Real Life

How to Go From Fear to Freedom, One Step at a Time

Editor’s note: This is a guest post from Tess Marshall of The Bold Life.

How to Build the Muscle of Change

Post written by Leo Babauta.

Principles of Growth

First Steps

It’s Not Too Late to Change Your Habits

Post written by Leo Babauta.

The Pause Upon Which All Else Relies

Post written by Leo Babauta.

Clearing Your Life for a New Year

Post written by Leo Babauta.

How to Have the Best Year of Your Life (without Setting a Single Goal)

Editor’s note: This is a guest post from Jeff Goins of Goins, Writer.

The Pointlessness of Plans

Instead of Goals

Reminder: Clutterfat Challenge Webinar Tonight

100 Days with No Goals

Editor’s Note: This is a guest post from Joshua Fields Millburn of The Minimalists.